Telecommunications was the most prominent industry in the list of categories of UK advertisers on social networking sites. Telefonica O2, Deutsche Telekom, and British Telecommunications, delivered altogether close to 950 million display ad impressions in the month of August.

Ranking second in the list of top advertisers was the retail industry, where leading brands such as Tesco, John Lewis and DFS, generated 753 million ad impressions during the same month, followed by banking brands with 248 million, travel with 213 million and last but not least, entertainment with 181 million ad views.

In addition the research also revealed that 15-24-year-olds were served the most ads, accounting for 29% of social network display ad impressions while representing 23% of the total audience. The leading marketing agency also found that, despite the demographics aiming towards younger users, all ages were reached.

comScore’s Managing Director Europe, Mike Read comments on the results: “These data suggest that every demographic segment is reached via social networking sites and that no particular age segment accounts for an overwhelming percentage of ads delivered.”

He continued, “Given the overall reach and volume of ads delivered on social networking sites, brand advertisers who ignore this channel may be missing a significant opportunity and enabling their competitors to gain a dominant share of voice in the channel.”

Consumers exposed to a brand’s influenced social media and paid search programs are 2.8 times more likely to search for that brand’s products compared to user’s who only saw paid search.

The new study produced by comScore, GroupM Search & M80, ‘The Influenced: Social Media, Search and the Interplay of Consideration and Consumption’ discusses the interconnection between search and social media and how brands which manage to combine activities on social media together with paid search campaigns, get a lot more out of their digital marketing activities by engaging directly with customers and generating a better ROI.

The study was aimed to explore different areas such as the impact of social media on search behavior over a three-month period where consumers were divided into three segments: paid search, social media and influenced social which includes those consumers exposed to influenced social media connected to a brand.

One interesting result revealed that click-through-rate (CTR) in paid search increased 50%  for those individuals who were exposed to both social media and paid search campaigns. More significantly and as explained in the research, when respondents entered a specific brand’s name on the query, the CTR on search ads went up to 11.8% from 4.5%.

Results also showed that in terms of time spent online, consumers exposed to both influenced social media and paid search spent 3 times more time as the average consumer (170 minutes vs. 65).

In result, the objective of the research was to show the direct correlation between social media and paid search. Other additional findings included:

* Consumers exposed to influenced social and paid search exhibit 223% heavier search behavior than consumers exposed to paid alone.

* 50% of social media-exposed searchers, search daily for product terms, compared to 33% of non-exposed searchers.

* In organic search, consumers searching on brand product terms who have been exposed to a brand’s social marketing campaign are 2.4 times more likely to click on organic links leading to the advertiser’s site than the average user seeing a brand’s paid search ad alone.

A unique aspect about social networks is that they offer the ability to identify and reach the exact  target audience while facilitating interaction between brands and existing or potential customers. But how do you know if your online marketing approaches are maximizing the exposure of your online business?

A comScore report shows some interesting data that could make those advertisers who invest only on creating fan pages think twice about their digital marketing strategy.

One out of every five ads viewed online comes from a social network.  In this case, Facebook and MySpace, the two most popular social networks, accounted for more than 80% of all ad impressions. In further detail, 9.2% of daily impressions were generated via MySpace, while 8.2% came from Facebook.

“Because the top social media sites can deliver high reach and frequency against target segments at a low cost, it appears that some advertisers are eager to use social networking sites as a new advertising delivery vehicle,” Jeff Hackett, comScore’s senior vice president declared.

In terms of advertisers, AT&T had the most ad impressions for the month of July with more than 2 billion impressions, which accounted for 30% of the company’s total number of impressions during that month. Expedian Interactive came in second with nearly 1.3 billion impressions for that category.

In conclusion, display ads running on social networks like Facebook and MySpace are proving to be quite effective, perhaps more effective than just fan pages or applications. There’s clearly a change in trend that cannot go unnoticed. Data show consumers are responding positively to the display ads they encounter while surfing on their favorite social network, thus leading to other positive results.

Advertising Age’s White Paper presents us with a complete study on recession-time case studies along with some of the most iconic online marketing campaigns that have succeeded during downturns from all industry sectors. Why am I saying this? Just so we can keep our chin up a bit and realize that there’s also a good side to the story.

Yes, it is indeed a dull period, however, we can say the Internet has been a soothing instrument for us and companies themselves in times of economic suppression especially in the midst of the Holiday Season. As Mike Sachoff from WebProNews puts it, holiday shopping has become a bright spot in the woeful economy.

According to comScore, through the first days of this year’s holiday shopping season up to Dec. 7th, online spending has reached up to $15.63 billion dollars. Just between December 1st and December 7th sales summed up to $4.45 billion- 7% more than last year.

“The online holiday shopping season has picked up noticeably since Thanksgiving as consumers have given in to the holiday spirit – and very attractive retailer discounts,” said ComScore chairman Gian Fulgoni, in a statement. “While this growth is certainly a positive development in this tough retail season, it also needs to be put into perspective.

This sudden awakening in spending is definitely good news and it’s bringing us all a little bit of hope regardless of the current situation. Not only that, but websites are becoming more interactive and user-friendly since Internet usage has increased.

Multiple testing of online stores has become critical for retailers. Today, most online stores have added rich-media content like videos, photos and made their sites more interactive and less complicated for users to enjoy hassle-free online purchases.

To read more about comScore’s Holiday shopping research visit www.comscore.com.